igrants. They therefore concluded to attempt to follow and
overtake Reed and his companions.

Mrs. Tamsen Donner was able to have crossed the mountains with her
children with either Tucker's or Reed's party. On account of her
husband's illness, however, she had firmly refused all entreaties, and
had resolutely determined to remain by his bedside. She was extremely
anxious, however, that her children should reach California; and Hiram
Miller relates that she offered five hundred dollars to any one in the
second relief party, who would take them in safety across the mountains.
When Cady and Stone decided to go, Mrs. Donner induced them to attempt
the rescue of these children, Frances, Georgia, and Eliza. They took
the children as far the cabins at the lake, and left them. Probably they
became aware of the impossibility of escaping the storm, and knew that
it would be sure death, for both themselves and the children, should
they take them any farther. In view of the terrible calamity which
befell Reed's party on account of this storm, and the fact that Cady and
Stone had a terrible struggle for life, every one must justify these men
in leaving the children at the cabins. The parting between the devoted
mother and her little ones is thus briefly described by Georgia Donner,
now Mrs. Babcock: "The men came. I listened to their talking as they
made their agreement. Then they took us, three little girls, up the
stone steps, and stood us on the bank. Mother came, put on our hoods and
cloaks, saying, as if she was talking more to herself than to us: 'I may
never see you again, but God will take care of you.' After traveling a
few miles, they left us on the snow, went ahead a short distance, talked
one to another, then came back, took us as far as Keseberg's cabin, and
left us."

Mr. Cady recalls the incident of leaving the children on the snow, but
says the party saw a coyote, and were attempting to get a shot at the
animal.

When Nicholas Clark awoke on the morning of the third day, the tent
was literally buried in freshly fallen snow. He was in what is known
as Jacob Donner's tent. Its only occupants besides himself were Mrs.
Elizabeth Donner, her son Lewis, and the Spanish boy, John Baptiste.
George Donner and wife were in their own tent, and with them was Mrs.
Elizabeth Donner's youngest child, Samuel. Mr. Clark says he can not
remember how long the storm lasted, but it seems as if it must have been
at least a week. The s